Lighter than a Feather
by Brandyllyn
Summary: A little vignette about one of Snape's attendences to a Death Eater meeting. I apologise fot the length, but it's a response to a challenge, and length was set out in the guidelines.


_Disclaimer: I do not own Severus Snape, Dumbledore, Voldemort or any member of the Malfoy family. I own three pennies and a handful of dustbunnies. You can have them if you wish, but I feel the need to warn you, those dust bunnies are vicious._

Rules:  
_1) A run-in with Voldy and Snape  
2) Snape somehow being made to wear something pink and frilly  
3) Snape receives the first-ever hug of his adult life from someone who he wouldn't kill for the action  
4 ) Must be a minimum of 750 words, a maximum of 1500._

_

* * *

_

**Lighter than a Feather**

Severus Snape stalked about, as Severus Snape was prone to do. He was making a valiant attempt to ignore the Dark Mark burning on his forearm. _Damn thing_, he silently cursed.

"Roach cluster." He snapped at the gargoyle at Dumbledore's study. He mounted the stairs with practiced haste. Haste for anyone who was not Snape; Snape never moved at anything other than a stately saunter- when he wasn't stalking about obviously.

"Again?" Dumbledore asked before Snape could get a word out. When Snape nodded Dumbledore rose to walk around his desk, "I worry about you, perhaps you shouldn't go tonight."

"To miss even one meeting is as much as signing my own death warrant Professor, and you know it."

"I do," Dumbledore said with a sigh, "but I fear you take too many risks."

"Headmaster, nothing short of the apocalypse itself or a pink tutu could stop me from my duty." His lips twisted into a wry grimace. Being a spy on the Death Eaters made one subject to certain hazards, but he was well used to them by now.

Dumbledore raised an eyebrow, "Really?" A tutu appeared over Snape's robes, "Then stay Severus, I will not lose you to that vile monster."

Snape sneered and made the tutu disappear with a wave of his wand. "No headmaster, I have… duties."

He left before he could hear Dumbledore's muttered, "Death is lighter than a feather my friend, duty heavier than a mountain."

Snape apparated into a clearing he did not recognize which wasn't abnormal in itself. The Death Eater meetings… floated for lack of a better word- so that Aurors could not find them.

He adjusted the mask covering his features absently. Any Death Eater worth his salt knew every other with or without the masks; they were an affectation. The Dark Lord insisted that they were to remind them that in his eyes, the loss of any one was no different than any other. There was only Voldemort- and everyone below him.

He glanced around him. The revel was already well underway, which was usual. His function as a spy at Hogwarts gave him more leeway than others for having a late arrival.

"Severus!"

Snape groaned, of all the people in the world, Lucius Malfoy ranked somewhere between pond scum and Harry Potter in his estimation. Worse, Lucius had been drinking.

Snape flinched when the blonde man threw an arm around his shoulder in a camaraderic hug, "Ithn't it fonderful?" He slurred, gesturing with the hand not occupied with sullying Snape's shoulder with its very presense, "Ith showth such _purposh_ when we get togetherth and accompith so mush."

Snape repressed recoiling in disgust, _Lucius Malfoy is too powerful to offend_ he silently reminded himself. He still stared at the hand on his sleeve as though it were a particularly loathsome insect.

"Oh yes Lucius, we accomplish so much when we gather." Thankfully, the man was to drunk to notice his sarcasm.

He was a bout to pull away when Lucius' words stopped him. "_He_ wants to see you."

Snape groaned. An audience with the Dark Lord never boded well. "When?"

"As shoon as you got here."

Snape cursed. Leave it to the damn man to wait to tell him such a thing. He pulled away and began walking towards the center of the clearing, obscured behind a large bonfire. Were those bones in the…? Snape decided not to think about it.

"Ah, my most faithful servant." The hiss could only come from one bring on this earth and Snape immediately prostrated himself from where he stood.

"Great Lord, I am humbled in your presence."

"Of course, of course," Voldemort waved an appendage dismissively. "But what news of Potter."

"Potter is an imbecile, your worshipfulness," Snape didn't even have to pretend emotion there. Potter _was_ an imbecile. "He thinks he can best you with the paltry magics he has learned from the incompetents Dumbledore has hired to teach Defense."

Voldemort's hiss sounded admonishing, "One of those incompetents was my most trusted follower. You must learn to watch your words Severus."

Snape barely flinched when he felt the pain begin in his spine. _Crucio_ was nothing new to him. But he made a show of begging for mercy, the Dark Lord liked it when his minions begged.

"Severus, I think that perhaps I must find new methods to convince you of your loyalty."

Snape had only a moment to process that comment when suddenly he felt like he was being roasted alive, and still under the effect of the crucio. It was pain beyond his wildest imagining.

Before he passed out, Snape idly wondered what it might have bee like if he had chosen another path, or was a little less adamant about his duties.

_"Death is lighter than a feather, duty heavier than a mountain."  
_

_

* * *

Note: The quote is not my own but belongs to Robert Jordon._


End file.
